A Skeptical Call To Arms

[LilWabbit]

That is setting the bar pretty low.

Let's set the bar then. After a few hiccups of our own.

 

[JarJar]

I would think Google would be the best bet for an answer to a question like that. I work in survey analysis and I know the sample sizes I like to see for different projects, but as for the equations to work out the percentages and what that actually represents...well, I'm not so sure on those - and also (like my antipathy towards "p-numbers") somewhat sceptical too. But 2,000 seems like a reasonable number for something like this.

Sorry, I was referring to this survey specifically.
There aren't any details about the application of the variables mentioned in the fine print.
No biggie.

 

[deirdre]

If anyone else was interested:

Not that it matters, as i was talking about Pennsylvania... but since i was curious, i verified with Wayback Machine all but 3 states (that i am choosing to assume had "after election acceptance of mail-in ballots" before Covid) and the conclusion: 15 states had mail-in rules allowing ballots to be accepted if postmarked the day before (5 states) or up to the day of election (8-10 states).



Texas only allows, if postmarked the day before election, until 5pm the day after election. but all other states are ranging from 3-10 days after election.

i couldnt verify DC and North Dakota (and i didnt feel like looking up their statutes). Ohio i verified back to March 2020.

Other 12 are: Alaska, California, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, New York (the only one in the Northeast), N. Carolina, N.Dakota, Ohio, Texas, Utah, Washington and surprisingly West Virginia.

 

[MikeG]

did your polling place team a republican volunteer with a democrat volunteer? I trust my state mostly because all the polling places (we see on the news anyway) team a repub and dem to work together and watch each other.

I think that is the simplest solution to lack of trust in elections.

How many right leaners did you have on your staff? How many left leaners? Did you have equal representation?

Do you personally feel that the excessive mail-in ballots (including those that arrived after election day) made this 2020 election unique, as far as trust in the system?

While i do think the vast vast majority of poll workers work in good faith, was there a way that you could have messed with votes if say you were one in a thousand that wasn't acting in good faith?

Good questions and apologies for the delay.

By law, polling places have minority party and majority party observes who are part of the precinct team. There are also provisions for registered observers to be present at the polling place as long as they do not interfere with voting.

We actually never talked about who belong to what party. I work in an area that is just about equally balanced, although the Republican Party has a slight edge. The New York Times had a great interactive map where you could look up party affiliation by zip code.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/upshot/2020-election-map.html

Mail-in voting was different in Pennsylvania than in other states. By law, they could not start counting until Election Day morning, so there was a delay for obvious reasons. https://ballotpedia.org/Processing,...bsentee/mail-in_ballots_in_Pennsylvania,_2020

I think COVID and a general interest in the election ramped up participation, to include mail ins. Turnout at my polling place was heavy. Probably 1,100 people voted in person, which was about 50%, not counting mail votes.

There are a lot of redundant checks against vote tampering. Every machine is certified by the county and sealed with cables and inspection tape. I record every cable and inspection tape removed with the precinct machine operator. This prevents a third party from interfering with machines as recently happened in Fulton County. https://www.reuters.com/world/us/pe...-voting-machines-after-2020-audit-2021-07-21/

Other steps include: (1) voters actually write their own ballots on the first voting machine, (2) they then cast their vote in a collection machine that scans the ballot and keeps a hard copy of it. The electronic copy is stored on a stick drive. None of the machines connect with any wireless source. (3) At the end of the day, the machine prints out a complete tally of all votes. (4) We do a hand count of all unused ballots before the vote and after it. (5) This count has to match all ballots cast, spoiled ballots, etc. Hand sanitizer accounted for a few spoiled ballots. (6) We count up all provisional ballots. All of this work is done in the presence of all poll workers and everyone signs every audit document.

Foolproof? No, but I think it is a good system.

 

[LilWabbit]

Many of the Fox News portions aren't even Fox News News, they're pundit and op ed sections, and many of those by guest writers because the regular staff wouldn't put their names on it.

Maybe we could start a separate thread on 'How to Detect a Biased Source' where people from all 'sides' of all arguments could offer helpful tips.

 

[econ41]

Maybe we could start a separate thread on 'How to Detect a Biased Source' where people from all 'sides' of all arguments could offer helpful tips.

Good suggestion. I've made an opening comment.

 

[ExistentialDreadLocks]

I had my doubts about Sandy Hook, but I definitely encountered Boston on a "left" site that found instances of these "faked" bombings and "crisis actors" across the globe, even in Africa, with an anti-Semitic twist (left and right and Semites can all be racist). The bombers had been setup, by the FBI, like the bombers of 9-11 had been setup. I think Boston can appeal to a lefty the way 9-11 might. Boston would also appeal to a righty.

Another lefty example is Fema camps. Also AIDS denialism definitely infected the left. And pre Corona, anti-vax also infected liberal left middle class.

I had been a Sandy Hook "Truther" back in the day. A close friend told me they worked with a SH parent and thus my escape from the rabbit "hell" began. I've been listening to a lot of the in depth coverage of the InfoWars defamation suit on the Knowledge Fight podcast. For the first time I've really been diving into the core of the facts on SH. I finally felt ready to explore it as I'm now in a safe place where I won't get sucked back in. It's a whole different world without conspiracies. Now I'm working with Prism Metanews on a group to help others in recovery. I can understand people like yourself, who had doubts, and even people like me who believed it fake but got away from that, but I can't fathom the people like Watts and Fetzer and Tracy who still think it's fake. Watts really believes it still. (She also gave away a lot about her psyche while being interviewed for Elizabeth Williamson's book on SH.)

 

[captancourgette]

Not sure if this is the right place, but instead of creating a separate thread.
But just in case its been claimed Trump gets huge rallies totally freewilling

Saw the photo of today trump rally, first thing that struck me is theres that same black guy in shades (I hope he washes that shirt) in the crowd again, which I thought was amusing.

From months ago in alaska

and Arizona

etc.

Nice work if you can get it I suppose, getting flown (unless its by greyhound ) around the country.

Though I do expect 99% of the ppl that turn up at his rallys do it without getting paid, and Trump I think can muster up much larger & more enthusiastic crowds than eg Biden/Clinton.

 

[Hevach]

There's been a lot of repeats noticed in the crowd that sits behind him (just a couple examples: a blond woman behind the repeat in the first two, and a second black man in the last two). It's pretty common in US politics that that group is mostly consisting of campaign staff, local affiliated candidates with their staff, and the occasional VIP tier donors to serve as a claque, so even when one is speaking to 50 bored walk ins in a venue meant for thousands the pictures and video show a nice dense and enthusiastic crowd around you. Regardless of campaign there's almost never random ticket holders in that group, everyone is either paying a *lot* of money to be there or being paid/endorsed to be there.

This is also why you see a lot of grumpy kids in that group, because their parents dragged them there and even Disney World is stupid if your parents drag you there when you want to play video games.

 

[deirdre]

Regardless of campaign there's almost never random ticket holders in that group, everyone is either paying a *lot* of money to be there or being paid/endorsed to be there.

that same black guy in shades

That's Micheal the Black Guy. He's given alot of interviews.

 

[Z.W. Wolf]

https://web.archive.org/web/2017092...-cherokee-indians-masons-obama-202153678.html

Michael Symonette... His alternative history holds that black and white people were in the Americas before the Native Americans and must unite against the Cherokee Indians... "the real KKK slave masters" and that Hillary Clinton is secretly plotting with ISIS to kill all black and white women in America.

...former member of the Nation of Yahweh, a violent black supremacist cult that was led by the charismatic Hulon Mitchell Jr. Mitchell went by the name Yahweh Ben Yahweh, which means "the Lord son of the Lord." He was convicted of conspiring to kill white people as an initiation right in 1992 and served 11 years of an 18-year sentence related to 14 murders in Miami in the 1980s.

Miami New Times reports that Symonette was charged with conspiracy in connection with two of the murders. His brother, another member of the cult, told the jury that Symonette beat one man who was later murdered and stuck a sharpened stick through another's eye. Symonette was acquitted, but Mitchell and 14 followers were convicted. Mitchell died in 2007.

It's unclear whether the Trump administration knows about Symonette's radical views or ties to the violent cult. But Trump routinely pointed out the "Blacks for Trump" signs during rallies.

Yahoo News asked the U.S. Secret Service whether it had any concerns about Symonette being in such proximity to the president.

Special Agent Joseph A. Casey responded: "Members of the general public who are granted access to a U.S. Secret Service protected site are subjected to established security protocols. For security reasons, the Secret Service does not comment on the means or methods used to conduct protective operations."

 

[captancourgette]

OK Michael Symonette thanks, wait what! .... why on earth do you want to feature prominently someone who's version of the truth is totally unhinged from reality?
Nevermind .. don't answer, since social media became all encompassing it feels like we're living more and more in a cartoon
The boiling of the frog, it can't keep on going can it? In 2040 will we look back at 2020 and go "oh the good ol' sane days when people behaved rationally"

 

[deirdre]

why on earth do you want to feature prominently someone who's version of the truth is totally unhinged from reality?

why on earth do you assume that they do? or did you mean why on earth would the media want to feature someone at a Trump rally so unhinged from reality?

 

[Mendel]

unhinged from reality

Source: https://imgur.com/gallery/Jyux1rd

could be 'shopped, ofc

 

[deirdre]

could be 'shopped, ofc

Source: https://twitter.com/aungeliquefox5/status/1192829766577139719?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1192829766577139719%7Ctwgr%5E2c971c99b57add3f9344a4721dcb95dc021fb977%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.snopes.com%2Ffact-check%2Fshirts-blacks-for-trump%2F

 

[captancourgette]

why on earth do you assume that they do? or did you mean why on earth would the media want to feature someone at a Trump rally so unhinged from reality?

Not the media, the people that choose who gets to be in the high profile places behind trump, and since this guy has been there at least 4 times I've seen, obviously they have no problems with him being there.

 

[FatPhil]

Not the media, the people that choose who gets to be in the high profile places behind trump, and since this guy has been there at least 4 times I've seen, obviously they have no problems with him being there.

I've always assumed that if they're facing the cameras, and the orator isn't facing them, then they're part of the show more than part of the audience. What one might call "extras".

 

[deirdre]

Not the media, the people that choose who gets to be in the high profile places behind trump, and since this guy has been there at least 4 times I've seen, obviously they have no problems with him being there.

He is supposed to be segregated out because of his political or religious beliefs? I guess we can start doing such things, but it sounds like a slippery slope to me.

Article:

To start, Michael wanted me to know that, no, Donald Trump doesn't pay him to come to rallies. And, no, nobody asks him to stand onstage behind the president, right in frame for the camera. Sitting on the old leather couch in his warm, muggy living room, Michael told me that he gets in line early, sometimes a day in advance, and then spends all night waiting. And he said there are often dozens of other Black people at those Trump events, "but they stay on the edges because they don't wanna be seen."

Source: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/02/blacks-for-trump-rallies-temple-love-cult-miami/

 

[Ann K]

He is supposed to be segregated out because of his political or religious beliefs? I guess we can start doing such things, but it sounds like a slippery slope to me.

It's a political rally, so an assumption might be made that he shares the political views of Trump, so that statement isn't well thought out. But go back and read the file that @Z.W. Wolf pulled up. (Post 131)

Michael Symonette... His alternative history holds that black and white people were in the Americas before the Native Americans and must unite against the Cherokee Indians... "the real KKK slave masters" and that Hillary Clinton is secretly plotting with ISIS to kill all black and white women in America.

...former member of the Nation of Yahweh, a violent black supremacist cult ...

Miami New Times reports that Symonette was charged with conspiracy in connection with two of the murders. His brother, another member of the cult, told the jury that Symonette beat one man who was later murdered and stuck a sharpened stick through another's eye.

It's unclear whether the Trump administration knows about Symonette's radical views or ties to the violent cult.

(There's another couple of conspiracy claims, by the way, but you don't want to hear them.)
It isn't his beliefs that are in question here. It's his previous behavior.

 

[deirdre]

so that statement isn't well thought out.

please stop speaking to me as if i'm an idiot. my statement is fine BECAUSE i dont have to go BACK and read zw's post.
Trump does not think "that Hillary Clinton is secretly plotting with ISIS to kill all black and white women in America."

It's his previous behavior.

He was acquitted.